As my thoughts wandered, my eye happened to catch on something going on a little further down the riverbank.
A blur of color caught my attention first—a golden gleam that I thought must be the sunlight reflecting off the water. But as I watched, I realized this was no stray sunbeam—it was an animal or an insect of some kind. The gleaming I had seen was coming from its rapidly beating wings, which were jewel-toned, much like the Drake’s were.
It was hard to make out the rest of the little creature—it flitted around above the surface of the water as though it was looking for something. After a moment, it flew over to the riverbank and I saw what it was hunting for.
Sitting on one of the big, thick blades of grass, was an insect about twice as big as my thumb that looked like a cross between a cricket and a bumble bee. It had the long, bent legs of a cricket and the fat, furry body of a bumble bee and it, too, was jewel-toned—which was what allowed me to see it, since it was the same green as the grass. But the sun shone off its carapace, making it seem to twinkle like a dew drop on the grass blade.
The creature with the gorgeous golden wings came flying suddenly up to the insect and I understood that it must be hunting. I expected to see it snap the shiny bumble-cricket off the blade of grass or maybe shoot out a long, sticky tongue like a frog and grab it that way.
Instead, to my surprise, the shimmering little predator opened its delicately pointed snout and shot out a tongue of flame, about two inches long.
Before the insect could move, it was fried to a crisp. The shining predator snapped it up and crunched it contentedly. I even thought I heard it humming to itself as it chewed.
Well, breakfast is served, I guess, I thought, watching silently as it ate its meal of deep-fried bumble-cricket. I shuddered at the sight, but who was I to judge? I’d just had blood for my own breakfast.
While the little predator was hovering in midair, chomping down its meal, I finally got a good look at it. It had a curved, S-shaped body and a fat little belly, rather like a seahorse but with tiny legs which were curled up under it. It seemed to have tiny arms too, but again they were curled in tight to its body as it flew. Apparently it didn’t use them for hunting. Its snout was long and delicate and its eyes, when it turned and saw me watching it, were large and dark, and intelligent.
Seeing me so close seemed to startle the flying seahorse thing because it took one look at me and darted away at once in the other direction.
I was sorry to see it go—it was a beautiful little thing—like a living jewel. I wondered if its wings were more like a butterfly’s or a Drake’s—it was impossible to see when they were beating so quickly.
But the little creature wasn’t looking where it was going. Startled by my presence, it was still keeping a wary eye on me as it zoomed ahead—right into danger.
There was a stand of trees—normal sized ones—straight ahead of it and they seemed to have a kind of glistening net strung between them. A net? No, I realized—it was a web. A web that was almost three feet across and five feet tall.
“Watch out!” I called to the little creature but of course it didn’t understand me. It blundered right into the sticky strands and was immediately caught, its jewel-toned wings entangled in the silvery web.
“Oh, no!” I exclaimed. “Hang on, little buddy—I’ll get you out.”
I approached the web slowly, trying not to frighten the little flying seahorse any more than it was already frightened. I felt responsible for it getting caught in the first place. After all, if I hadn’t startled it, it wouldn’t have run from me and gotten trapped in the web.
As I got closer, the little seahorse struggled harder and began to make a bell-like chiming sound from its tiny mouth. It shot out tiny tongues of fire as though trying to burn the web, but the sticky strands must have been tougher than they looked, or else maybe they had a natural flame-retardant quality, because they didn’t burn very well at all.
“It’s okay,” I tried to reassure the little creature. “It’s okay—I’ll help you get out of there.”
I was almost to the trees the web was strung between when I noticed that one of their trunks had a big, dark lump on it. It looked like part of the trunk—except their trunks were white, like birch trees. This lump was black. I frowned. Could it be some kind of disease process? Like Dutch Elm Disease or something?
Then the lump moved.
It rose up from the white trunk of the tree and scuttled down onto the web. I felt my gorge rise as I saw exactly what it was…
A spider as big as my head.
70
Kaitlyn
When the spider stepped onto the web, its long, furry legs testing the sticky strands, the little flying seahorse began to struggle more frantically than ever. It made that clear, chiming sound again, like someone ringing a doorbell over and over. I wondered if it was a cry of alarm or a cry for help.
If it was crying for help, there was none to be had. I didn’t see any more of the jewel-toned flying seahorses anywhere. It looked like I was the only one who could help the little guy out of his very sticky situation.
If I could get past the enormous spider, that was.
I’ve never liked bugs in the best of times. We have some pretty big ones in Florida—roaches as big as your thumb called Palmetto
